And From the Ashes, a Shady Architect Is Born

Covering a topic that no other magazine in history has ever dared to cover before, new publication Architect has announced its official launch.

Now here’s the bad news:

1) Architect’s publishing company Hanley Wood recently acquired two magazines, Architectural Lighting and Architecture, folding Architecture. Word on the street is that everyone but the lighting staff were booted and there were no severance packages given to Architecture’s employees

2) Abbott Miller designed the new mag, we’re sure will be beautiful (and will not look like the mock cover above which was created a year ago), but do we seem to remember something posted by William Drenttel in the comments of a Design Observer article about Architect:

Ned Cramer has been named to be the editor of a new magazine, Architect, to be published out of Washington DC by Hanley Wood. They have contacted a short-list of Jop van Bennekom, Green Dragon Office (Lorraine Wild), Bruce Mau Design, Pentagram (Abbott Miller), Lucille Tenazas, Thirst (Rick Valicenti) and Winterhouse (Jessica Helfand + William Drenttel). After portfolio reviews with Hadley Wood management, they have proposed a round of free designs.

Spec work and no severance! That’s a great way to start a magazine.

Update: Abbott Miller writes to tell us there was no spec thing–he indeed got paid:

That whole story was odd to me because I was never asked to do anything on spec. Ned Cramer asked me to come to present my work at a meeting. Once the story broke on Design Observer I called Ned to say that if being considered meant doing any spec work at all, I shouldn’t bother to come meet. He assured me that they were not expecting anything like that. Right now we are working to bring the first issue together.

Whew. Now we just have to start that pledge drive for the former staff of Architecture.